Insitu Pacific, the Australia-based subsidiary of Insitu Inc., today announced it recently conducted a successful demonstration for the New South Wales Rural Fire Service (NSW RFS) using the ScanEagle unmanned aircraft system (UAS).

The demonstration took place in January over the Wollemi National Park, 150 km northwest of Sydney, where fires have burned more than 35,000 hectares of bushland since December 2013. Insitu Pacific successfully demonstrated the operational utility of ScanEagle to monitor and report on the movement of the fire front at night – a task rarely undertaken at low altitude by manned aircraft due to the high risk factors involved.

The success of the trial is attributed to a collaborative effort between Insitu Pacific and General Dynamics Mediaware. Insitu Pacific employed General Dynamics Mediaware’s next-generation video exploitation system, D-VEX, to stream full-motion video imagery alongside geo-location information in near real time.